Compared with the Civil War
in the United States, the contemporary French
intervention in Mexico seems but a slight episode, little more than
an eddy in
the tremendous current of greater events. But as a unique passage in
the
diversified history of Mexico, no less than in its bearings upon
European
attitudes toward the United States at a critical time, the story of
Maximilian's ill-starred empire, and of his own fate, possesses a
distinct
interest.
The French expedition against Mexico had at first the backing of
England
and Spain. Its professed object was "to demand from the Mexican
authorities
more efficacious protection for the persons and properties" of the
subjects of
England, France, and Spain in Mexico, and fulfilment of the
obligations
contracted toward the sovereigns of the three former countries by
the latter.
Finding that France wished to go beyond this design in Mexico, and
failing to
agree with her upon a plan of action, England and Spain withdrew
from the
undertaking. But Napoleon himself was determined to establish "a
sort of
feudatory monarchy" in Mexico. How he went about the accomplishment
of

this purpose is well shown, in
few words, by Fyffe, the excellent historian of
modern Europe. The tragic ending of this enterprise is described by
a
prominent participant in the events here narrated, Prince Felix
Salm-Salm. He
was a German soldier of fortune who came to the United States in
1861, entered
the Union army, and rose to the rank of brevet brigadier-general of
volunteers. In 1866 he entered Maximilian's service in Mexico, and,
as
aide-de-camp to the Emperor and chief of the imperial household,
shared
intimately in his experiences. After the execution of Maximilian,
Salm-Salm
entered the Prussian army, and was killed at the battle of
Gravelotte, August
18, 1870.
Text
There were in Napoleon III, as a man of state, two personalities,
two
mental existences, which blended but ill with each other. There was
the
contemplator of great human forces, the intelligent, if not deeply
penetrative, reader of the signs of the times, the brooder through
long years
of imprisonment and exile, the child of Europe, to whom Germany,
Italy, and
England had all in turn been nearer than his own country; and there
was the
crowned adventurer, bound by his name and position to gain for
France
something that it did not possess, and to regard the greatness of
every other
nation as an impediment to the ascendency of his own.
Napoleon correctly judged the principle of nationality to be the
dominant
force in the immediate future of Europe. He saw in Italy and in
Germany races
whose internal divisions alone had prevented them from being the
formidable
rivals of France, and yet he assisted the one nation to effect its
union, and
was not indisposed, within certain limits, to promote the
consolidation of the
other. That the acquisition of Nice and Savoy, and even of the
Rhenish
Provinces, could not in itself make up to France for the
establishment of two
great nations on its immediate frontiers Napoleon must have well
understood:
he sought to carry the principle of agglomeration a stage further in
the
interests of France itself, and to form some moral, if not
political, union of
the Latin nations, which should embrace under his own ascendency
communities
beyond the Atlantic as well as those of the Old World. It was with
this design
that in the year 1862 he made the financial misdemeanors of Mexico
the pretext
for an expedition to that country, the object of which was to
subvert the
native republican Government, and to place the Hapsburg Maximilian,
as a
vassal prince, on its throne.
The design of Napoleon to establish French influence in Mexico was
connected with his attempt to break up the United States by
establishing the
independence of the Southern Confederacy, then in rebellion, through
the
mediation of the great Powers of Europe. So long as the Civil War in
the
United States lasted, it seemed likely that Napoleon's enterprise in
Mexico
would be successful. Maximilian was placed upon the throne, and the
republican leader, Juarez, was driven into the extreme north of the
country.
But with the overthrow of the Southern Confederacy and the
restoration of
peace in the United States in 1865 the prospect totally changed. The
Government of Washington refused to acknowledge any authority in
Mexico but
that of Juarez, and informed Napoleon in courteous terms that his
troops must
be withdrawn. Napoleon had bound himself by treaty to keep
twenty-five
thousand men in Mexico for the protection of Maximilian. He was,
however,
unable to defy the order of the United States.
Early in 1866 he acquainted Maximilian with the necessities of the
situation, and with the approaching removal of the force which alone
had
placed him and could sustain him on the throne. The unfortunate
Prince sent
his consort, Carlotta, daughter of the King of the Belgians, to
Europe to
plead against this act of desertion; but her efforts were vain, and
her reason
sank under the just presentiment of her husband's ruin. The utmost
on which
Napoleon could venture was the postponement of the recall of his
troops till
the spring of 1867. He urged Maximilian to abdicate before it was
too late;
but the Prince refused to dissociate himself from his counsellors
who still
implored him to remain.
Meanwhile the Juarists pressed back toward the capital from north
and
south. As the French detachments were withdrawn toward the coast the
entire
country fell into their hands. The last French soldiers quitted
Mexico at the
beginning of March, 1867, and on May 15th Maximilian, still
lingering at
Queretaro, was made prisoner by the Republicans. He had himself
while in
power ordered that the partisans of Juarez should be treated, not as
soldiers,
but as brigands, and that when captured they should be tried by
court-martial
and executed within twenty-four hours. The same severity was applied
to
himself. He was sentenced to death and shot at Queretaro on June
19th.
Thus ended the attempt of Napoleon III to establish the influence of
France and of his dynasty beyond the seas. The doom of Maximilian
excited the
compassion of Europe; a deep, irreparable wound was inflicted on the
reputation of the man who had tempted him to his treacherous throne,
who had
guaranteed him protection, and at the bidding of a superior power
had
abandoned him to his ruin. From this time, though the outward
splendor of the
Empire was undiminished, there remained scarcely anything of the
personal
prestige which Napoleon had once enjoyed in so rich a measure. He
was no
longer in the eyes of Europe or of his own country the profound,
self-contained statesman in whose brain lay the secret of coming
events; he
was rather the gambler whom Fortune was preparing to desert, the
usurper
trembling for the future of his dynasty and his crown.